1. Field of Invention
The present invention relates to an air bag device for a seat next to a driver, namely, a passenger seat and, in more particularly, to an air bag device for a passenger seat which includes an air bag stored in a folded state and having a gas inlet port, an inflator for feeding gas to the air bag, a case for enclosing and storing the inflator in the rear portion thereof and the air bag in the front portion thereof, and a cover member for covering the front surface opening of the case. The case further includes an air bag opening in the horizontal direction thereof (that is, when unfolded, the air bag can be projected out from the air bag opening towards a passenger).
2. Description of Related Art
In FIG. 1, there is shown an example of a conventional air bag device for a passenger seat.
The conventional air bag device comprises an air bag 1 which is stored in a folded state and includes a rectangular gas inflow opening 2, an inflator 3 for feeding gas to the air bag 1, a case 5 for enclosing and storing the inflator 3 in the rear portion thereof, and the air bag 1 in the front portion thereof, and a cover member 7 for covering the front surface of the case 5. The case 5 includes an air bag opening in the horizontal direction thereof.
In the illustrated conventional air bag device, the case 5 is divided into two parts; that is, a rear case 8 for storing the inflator 3 and a front case 9 for storing the air bag 1. In order to connect the rear and front cases to each other, there is provided a mounting flange 14 which includes an outer flange 11 and an inner flange 12 respectively provided in the rear and front cases. The air bag 1 is mounted in such a manner that it is bolted or riveted (in the illustrated case, it is fixed by bolts 18) to a mounting flange 14 through a rectangular ring retainer 16.
The air bag 1, when stored, as shown in FIG. 1, is in a zigzag, folded condition. That is, the air bag 1 is a so called bellows-type airbag.
However, in the above-mentioned bellows-type air bag, since the air bag is folded from the base portion thereof to the last portion thereof, the number of the zigzag folds is large and a man-hours required for folding the air bag is relatively great. Also, when the air bag is foldedly stored, in order to maintain the thick fold state (zigzag fold state) of the air bag, it is necessary to store the air bag into the case while holding the entire air bag by hand, which means that the air bag cannot be set into the case efficiently.
Also, when the air bag is unfolded, the air bag is liable to unfold downwardly of a horizontal direction due to gravity (due to its own weight). As a result, the air bag at first reaches the lap portion of a passenger and, thereafter, it arrives at the breasts portion of the passenger. Therefore, the conventional air bag cannot always offer an effective unfolding characteristic, namely, it cannot efficiently absorb shock